Ryan Zinke Blames 'Radical Environmentalists' For California Fires

Just seconds after Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said that now is not the time to point fingers in the devastating record wildfires in California, he declared Sunday that the deadly blazes are entirely the fault of “radical environmentalists.”

“I will lay this on the foot of those environmental radicals that have prevented us from managing the forests for years. And you know what? This is on them,” Zinke said in an interview on Breitbart News. (Listen above at the 5:20 mark).

“In many cases, it’s these radical environmentalists who want nature to take its course. We have dead and dying timber. We can manage it using best science, best practices. But to let this devastation go on year after year after year is unacceptable, it’s not going to happen. The president is absolutely engaged,” he said earlier in the interview.

Brown said that while forest management is one element of preventing fires, “managing all the forests everywhere ... does not stop climate change — and those that deny that are definitely contributing to the tragedy. The chickens are coming home to roost. This is real here.” On “Face the Nation” on Sunday, Brown said that in “less than five years, even the worst skeptics are going to be believers” in climate change.

Trump has called climate change a “hoax.” When reporters asked him about his attitude during his visit Saturday to fire-ravaged Paradise, California, the president responded: “I have a strong opinion: I want great climate. We’re going to have that.”

Trump tweeted early on that the fires were the result of “gross mismanagement of the forests.” The federal government owns nearly 60 percent of the forests in California, while the state controls only 3 percent. Paradise, the scene of the deadliest fire in California history with at least 77 killed and close to 1,000 still listed as missing, is surrounded by federal forests.

Fire officials in Southern California said the blazes there had “nothing to do with forest management” but erupted and spread in urban and suburban communities, including areas in Los Angeles County like Malibu and Calabasas.

Mr. President, with all due respect, you are wrong. The fires in So. Cal are urban interface fires and have NOTHING to do with forest management. Come to SoCal and learn the facts & help the victims. Scott Austin, Pres IAFF 809. @IAFFNewsDeskhttps://t.co/d3jY0SeosF

“We need strong, science-based leadership from our elected leaders — not factless tweets and unfounded theories from Donald Trump and Ryan Zinke — to limit the damage from fires fueled by climate change and to protect vulnerable people, places, and wildlife,” the Sierra Club said in a statement last week before Zinke’s latest comments.